Ranji Trophy: Madhya Pradesh show they are ready for a scrap

Lightweights Madhya Pradesh gave an ample demonstration that they won’t be mere pushovers as they landed some decent blows on super heavyweights Mumbai on an engrossing opening day of the Ranji Trophy final here on Wednesday.

On a lively pitch where something kept happening right throughout the day, Madhya Pradesh were rewarded for their consistent lines and lengths, reducing 41-time champions Mumbai to 248/5 at stumps at the Chinnaswamy Stadium.

Given the brilliant form Mumbai batters were in coming into the title clash, Madhya Pradesh knew their bowlers had to be at their best. Coached by the tactically strong Chandrakant Pandit, MP bowlers figured the best way to contain Mumbai was to pick wickets at regular intervals which meant bowling attacking lines consistently. The ploy, of course, came with rider—sacrificing runs.

Mumbai openers Yashasvi Jaiswal (78, 163b, 7x4, 1x6) and Prithvi Shaw (47, 79b, 5x4, 1x6) made the most of those attacking lines to get their side off to a fine start on a glorious day for cricket where the sun appeared only in the final session. While Jaiswal was compact and hardly troubled, pacers Anubhav Agarwal (2/56) and Gaurav Yadav, unlucky to be wicketless, had Shaw in all sorts of problem.

They kept taking the ball away from Shaw and the right-hander, known for his flashy style, played and missed a bunch of deliveries. The 12th over by Gaurav was top-notch, the seamer beating Shaw’s edges on five occasions. Gaurav literally went down on his knees in disbelief for not seeing the back of Shaw.

The Mumbai skipper weathered the storm and then slowly opened his shoulders. Jaiswal, nicely mixing caution with aggression, too started to play his shots as Mumbai began to take control. MP needed someone to lift their spirits and Agarwal did it, cleaning up Shaw with a fine in-swinger to end the 87-run opening stand.

Thereafter MP kept chipping in, never allowing Mumbai to get away with the game. Every time Mumbai appeared to be forging a strong partnership, MP would strike, almost against the run of play, to derail whatever momentum the domestic giants would have gained.

The three wickets in the second session, one of them to a wonderful piece of captaincy from Aditya Shrivastava where he deployed a shortish midwicket and prised out Arman Jaffer through smart bowling from Kumar Kartikeya, gave MP the confidence of enforcing the issue.

Spinners Kartikeya (1/91) and Saransh Jain (2/31), bowling with packed on-side fields, tempted Sarfaraz Khan and Hardik Tamore to come at them. The batters though refused to fall for the bait, opting to play defensively. But the wicket was such where being ultra defensive had its pitfalls and Tamore, centurion in the semifinal, got a taste of it in the final session.

Sarfaraz, Mumbai’s leading run-getter this season, and in-form all-rounder Shams Mulani though thwarted MP from making any further inroads with some gritty batting. They chose to play out the day and resume the fight for Thursday. With MP having taken the new ball and the pitch offering help, Thursday’s morning session could prove crucial for Mumbai’s pursuit of a big total.